Nail brush



plzolw' y J- J.' CHAPPELL, Er AL 439,922

NAIL BRUSH Filed Deo, 15' 1944- INVENTORS JOSEPH J, CHAPPELL- BY umlmmn n Ubbom ATTORNEYS Patented Apr. 20, 1948 NAIL BRUSH Joseph J. Chappell, Lockland, and Marianne R.

Osborne, Cincinnati, Ohio Application December 15, 1944, Serial No. 568,284

1 Claim.

Our invention relates to improvements in nail brushes and more particularly to the type of nail brush in which a relatively narrow row of bristles is provided which are designed to enter the space between the end of the nger and the nail.

In such.brushes there are several diiiiculties. In the first place it is not easy to keep the bristles in proper position behind the nail during a brushing operation. Also it is necessary for a proper brushing without injuring the tender iiesh at the base of the nail to hold back the flesh of the iinger tip somewhat and use the iinger tip as an abutment which keeps the brush from injurious puncturing of the esh at the base of the nail. Also it is desirable to hold the esh of the finger tip away at the side edges or corners of the nail to thoroughly scrub that portion which is normally diicult to get at.

It is with the object of solving the above difficulties in a brush of the type described, that we have developed our invention.

In the drawings, an example of our invention is shown in which the nail brush element is combined with a hand brush which is readily possible in a brush using a relatively narrow row of bristles for the cleansing of the nails, such a narrow row not preventing the use of a handle-on one end of which the broader brush is mounted. It is not necessary that this combination be employed, although it is useful. We will describe our invention in connection with the said illustrated example, the novelty inherent in the struc-A ture being set forth in the appended claim to which reference is hereby made.

.In the drawings:

Figure 1 is a perspective of the brush.

Figure 2 is a cross section of the brush taken on the line 2-2 of Fig. l.

It will be preferable to form the handle and body portion of the brush from plastic material which may readily be molded to the shape required. We have shown a brush of bristles l on a wide base or back 2, which forms part of a 2 tapered and the mounting 'I tapered in the reverse direction and the mounting driven into the channel, or the mounting l' may be removably held in the channel 5 in other ways well known in the art. The letter arrangement will make it easy to renew the bristles 5.

The base portion 4 is formed so that the walls of the channel 5 at both sides, drop away abruptly in a curve to form grooves 8, the outer walls of which rise to a height 9, which is somewhat lower than the level of the inner upper edge of the groove walls. In our preferred construction the two grooves alongside of the main channel walls, are around one-eighth of an inch wide with the outer wall edges being also the edges of the base and located an eighth of an inch or thereabouts, below the crests of the inner Walls. These curved bottom grooves are located at each side of the brush bristle channel for working on right and left hands.

The result of this construction is that when the base portion is pressed against the nger tip the groove alongside of the bristles grips the nger tip pulling the flesh somewhat away from the nail, and opening the space behind the nail for cleansing. Also the groove edge penetrating the flesh somewhat tends to guide the bristles in a straight path as the user attempts to cause them to traverse the space behind the nail. Also the proportions of the side grooves serve to tip the brush at the correct angle to enter the nail somewhat at a slant to the direction of the nail, thus assisting in cleansing the nail wall although also cleansing the flesh of the finger behind the nail.

The abutment of the portion d against the finger assists in preventing penetration of the bristles into the iiesh at theV b-ase of the nail.

It is apparent that the device of mounting the nail brush on the small end of the handle and backing of a larger flesh brush provides in a single piece of equipment, for the thorough cleansing of the hands and nails. The narrow bristles arrangement is also excellent for traversing the line between theface of the nail and the ilesh of the finger. The arrangement of the bristles in a row of tufts tapering as they do to a point, assists in the cleansing operations now -described so that the bristles can enter to the base of the unattached portion of the nail and at the same time traverse the nail wall and the finger tip ilesh beneath the nail.

Having thus described our invention, what we claim as new and desire to secure by Letters Patent is:

In a nail brush a base portion in which a, narrow row of bristles is mounted lengthwise thereof, said base portion having a narrow groove formed therein at one side thereof, at least, alongside of the inner ends of the bristles and facing in the direction of the bristles, the outer edge of the groove being the edge of the base, for the purpose described, saidlgrooye having itsinner wall be- 10 4 REFERENCES CITED The following references are of record in the iile of this patent:

UNITED STATES PATENTS Number Name Date 1,603,399 Pasnik Oct. 19, 1926 1,982,660 Handy Dec. 4, 1934 2,312,828 Adamsson Mar. 2, 1943 FOREIGNy PATENTS Number Country Date 82,087 Sweden Nov. 27, 1934 495,982 Great Britain Nov. 23, 1938 

